Archive for the ‘dialogical reasoning’ Category

Here is the Pope’s definition of truth, playing on the Greek expression for the Word (of God): “Truth, in fact, is lógos which creates diá-logos, and hence communication and communion.” Truth requires communication with others’ truth. The very next sentence explains what he means by communication, namely if a person is not willing to let go of his personal opinions, he cannot have the truth: “Truth, by enabling men and women to let go of their subjective opinions and impressions, allows them to move beyond cultural and historical limitations and to come together in the assessment of the value and substance of things” (§4). Without such a sharing with others there is no truth, for man is isolated in his “subjective opinions.” (Fr. Scott, “HUMANIST MANIFESTO: A commentary on the encyclical Caritas in veritate”)

I have suggested in the past that those who seek to know the origin of Benedict’s (and many other bishops’, particularly Cardinal Kasper) foreign concept of “dialogue” must look to the writings of hasidic philosopher Martin Buber (and the Bal Shem Tov and other kabbalists Buber’s thinking was derived from), who Benedict and Kasper have both plainly said is a major influence.

The Gospel tells us Jesus taught as one having authority. The Truths of Jesus’ teachings weren’t arrived at through ‘dialogue’ with Pharisees as a means of “moving beyond cultural and historical limitations.” Neither do we see such an example in the Apostles or the Church fathers. Benedict is preaching an anti-Gospel. He’s claiming a “sacred” mandate to get us seated at the table with the lawyers so that they can defraud us with their word magic. There is no example for “sacred dialogue” in the Church canon. Beware these hasidic teachings of Benedict XVI. They lead to ruin.

Here is the Pope’s definition of truth, playing on the Greek expression for the Word (of God): “Truth, in fact, is lógos which creates diá-logos, and hence communication and communion.” Truth requires communication with others’ truth. The very next sentence explains what he means by communication, namely if a person is not willing to let go of his personal opinions, he cannot have the truth: “Truth, by enabling men and women to let go of their subjective opinions and impressions, allows them to move beyond cultural and historical limitations and to come together in the assessment of the value and substance of things” (§4). Without such a sharing with others there is no truth, for man is isolated in his “subjective opinions.” (Fr. Scott, “HUMANIST MANIFESTO: A commentary on the encyclical Caritas in veritate”)

I have suggested in the past that those who seek to know the origin of Benedict’s (and many other bishops’, particularly Cardinal Kasper) foreign concept of “dialogue” must look to the writings of hasidic philosopher Martin Buber (and the Bal Shem Tov and other kabbalists Buber’s thinking was derived from), who Benedict and Kasper have both plainly said is a major influence.

The Gospel tells us Jesus taught as one having authority. The Truths of Jesus’ teachings weren’t arrived at through ‘dialogue’ with Pharisees as a means of “moving beyond cultural and historical limitations.” Neither do we see such an example in the Apostles or the Church fathers. Benedict is preaching an anti-Gospel. He’s claiming a “sacred” mandate to get us seated at the table with the lawyers so that they can defraud us with their word magic. There is no example for “sacred dialogue” in the Church canon. Beware these hasidic teachings of Benedict XVI. They lead to ruin.

Benedict is preaching an anti-Gospel here. Christians have a sacred duty to evangelize. There is no sacred duty to “dialogue.” Benedict has drawn this idea of a “sacred duty” of intereligious “dialogue” not from any Christian text but from the Summa Nonsensica of the Hasidic psuedo-philosopher, Martin Buber who Benedict values more than the philosopher of the Church, St. Thomas.

“The indwelling Glory [of god] embraces all worlds, all creatures, good and evil. And it is the true Unity. How then, you ask, can it bear in itself the opposites of good and evil? But in truth there is no opposite, for Evil is the throne of Good.” (Martin Buber, Hasidism and Modern Man, p. 200)

“We then found the philosophy of personalism reiterated with renewed conviction in the great Jewish thinker Martin Buber. This encounter with personalism was for me a spiritual experience that left an essential mark, especially since I spontaneously associated such personalism with the thought of Saint Augustine, who in his Confessions had struck me with the power of all his human passion and depth. By contrast, I had difficulties in penetrating the thought of Thomas Aquinas, whose crystal-clear logic seemed to me to be too closed in on itself, too impersonal and ready-made.” (Benedict XVI, Milestones, p.44)

Pope Calls Dialogue a Sacred Duty

Notes Advances in Jewish-Catholic Relations

VATICAN CITY, OCT. 30, 2008 (Zenit.org).- Benedict XVI says interreligious dialogue is becoming more and more a sacred duty in a troubled world.

The Pope affirmed this today when he addressed the International Jewish Committee on Interreligious Consultations, a group that has worked with the Holy See for more than 30 years, contributing to “greater understanding and acceptance between Catholics and Jews.”

“Christians today are increasingly conscious of the spiritual patrimony they share with the people of the Torah, the people chosen by God in his inexpressible mercy, a patrimony that calls for greater mutual appreciation, respect and love,” the Holy Father said. “Jews too are challenged to discover what they have in common with all who believe in the Lord, the God of Israel, who first revealed himself through his powerful and life-giving word.”

That word, he continued, “spurs us to bear common witness to God’s love, mercy and truth. This is a vital service in our own time, threatened by the loss of the spiritual and moral values which guarantee human dignity, solidarity, justice and peace.”

Benedict XVI encouraged the committee in their efforts to foster dialogue between religions.

“In our troubled world, so frequently marked by poverty, violence and exploitation, dialogue between cultures and religions must more and more be seen as a sacred duty incumbent upon all those who are committed to building a world worthy of man,” he said. “The ability to accept and respect one another, and to speak the truth in love, is essential for overcoming differences, preventing misunderstandings and avoiding needless confrontations. […] A sincere dialogue needs both openness and a firm sense of identity on both sides, in order for each to be enriched by the gifts of the other.”

The Holy Father said he thanks God for recent meetings he has had with Jewish communities in New York, Paris and the Vatican, “and for the progress in Catholic-Jewish relations which they reflect.”

“In this spirit, then,” he concluded, “I encourage you to persevere in your important work with patience and renewed commitment.”

Next month in Hungary, the International Jewish Committee on Interreligious Consultations will meet with the Vatican Commission for Religious Relations With the Jews on the theme “Religion and Civil Society.”

Benedict is preaching an anti-Gospel here. Christians have a sacred duty to evangelize. There is no sacred duty to “dialogue.” Benedict has drawn this idea of a “sacred duty” of intereligious “dialogue” not from any Christian text but from the Summa Nonsensica of the Hasidic psuedo-philosopher, Martin Buber who Benedict values more than the philosopher of the Church, St. Thomas.

“The indwelling Glory [of god] embraces all worlds, all creatures, good and evil. And it is the true Unity. How then, you ask, can it bear in itself the opposites of good and evil? But in truth there is no opposite, for Evil is the throne of Good.” (Martin Buber, Hasidism and Modern Man, p. 200)

“We then found the philosophy of personalism reiterated with renewed conviction in the great Jewish thinker Martin Buber. This encounter with personalism was for me a spiritual experience that left an essential mark, especially since I spontaneously associated such personalism with the thought of Saint Augustine, who in his Confessions had struck me with the power of all his human passion and depth. By contrast, I had difficulties in penetrating the thought of Thomas Aquinas, whose crystal-clear logic seemed to me to be too closed in on itself, too impersonal and ready-made.” (Benedict XVI, Milestones, p.44)

Pope Calls Dialogue a Sacred Duty

Notes Advances in Jewish-Catholic Relations

VATICAN CITY, OCT. 30, 2008 (Zenit.org).- Benedict XVI says interreligious dialogue is becoming more and more a sacred duty in a troubled world.

The Pope affirmed this today when he addressed the International Jewish Committee on Interreligious Consultations, a group that has worked with the Holy See for more than 30 years, contributing to “greater understanding and acceptance between Catholics and Jews.”

“Christians today are increasingly conscious of the spiritual patrimony they share with the people of the Torah, the people chosen by God in his inexpressible mercy, a patrimony that calls for greater mutual appreciation, respect and love,” the Holy Father said. “Jews too are challenged to discover what they have in common with all who believe in the Lord, the God of Israel, who first revealed himself through his powerful and life-giving word.”

That word, he continued, “spurs us to bear common witness to God’s love, mercy and truth. This is a vital service in our own time, threatened by the loss of the spiritual and moral values which guarantee human dignity, solidarity, justice and peace.”

Benedict XVI encouraged the committee in their efforts to foster dialogue between religions.

“In our troubled world, so frequently marked by poverty, violence and exploitation, dialogue between cultures and religions must more and more be seen as a sacred duty incumbent upon all those who are committed to building a world worthy of man,” he said. “The ability to accept and respect one another, and to speak the truth in love, is essential for overcoming differences, preventing misunderstandings and avoiding needless confrontations. […] A sincere dialogue needs both openness and a firm sense of identity on both sides, in order for each to be enriched by the gifts of the other.”

The Holy Father said he thanks God for recent meetings he has had with Jewish communities in New York, Paris and the Vatican, “and for the progress in Catholic-Jewish relations which they reflect.”

“In this spirit, then,” he concluded, “I encourage you to persevere in your important work with patience and renewed commitment.”

Next month in Hungary, the International Jewish Committee on Interreligious Consultations will meet with the Vatican Commission for Religious Relations With the Jews on the theme “Religion and Civil Society.”

Pilpul, simply put, is a rabbinic dialectical process of “debate” or discussion by which a predetermined outcome is arrived at. It’s the Pharisaic tradition which Jesus Christ condemned calling it a “tradition of men” which “makes void the word of God.” Both the Jerusalem and Babylonian Talmuds are filled with pilpul which in most cases is for the purpose of circumventing Biblical law. The article below tells of rabbis and kosher-Catholic priests engaged in pilul for the purpose of circumventing the Gospel which condemns the very act they are engaged in. See Mark 7;13 for Christ’s condemnation and Mishnah tractate Nedarim for the pilpul through which the “corban” that Christ condemned in Mark 7;13 was synthesized. And note that Jesus did not only condemn the Pharisaic “corban” invention and ritual hand washing, but He said, “many other such like things you [Pharisees] do.”

Believe me when I tell you, in this “Judeo-Christian dialogue”–what is in reality pilpul–the rabbis aren’t interested in hearing the Gospel. They’re interested in finding ways around the Gospel, like their Pharisaic ideological forefathers found ways around Old Testament law. They intend to make the Gospel of none effect.

… if there were a transcript of the proceedings it would read very much like a discussion in the Talmud.

Rabbis and Catholic priests in dialogue

By Mark L. Shook – St. Louis Post Dispatch

June 19, 2008

The Vatican has taken great pains to define and structure religious dialogues between faith communities. As recently as June 7, Pope Benedict II spoke to the Pontifical Council for Inter-religious Dialogue of “the importance of truth being the goal of all dialogue and charity being the motivation behind all dialogue.” The content of the council’s meeting and the Pope’s statement seem to imply that religious dialogue is in need of guidelines to keep Catholic participants true to Church doctrine. But very few inter-faith dialogues deal with matters of deep theological import. Most are simply efforts to establish rapport and understanding.

Religious dialogues succeed or fail because of trust and respect. Achieving trust and respect takes time and dedication. Here is yet another example of a process which does not respond well to our need for instant gratification. Rabbis and priests in St. Louis have been in dialogue with each other for more than ten years. That dialogue would never have gotten off the ground had it not been for the personal bonds of friendship which existed between Father Vincent Heier, former Ecumenical officer of the St. Louis Archdiocese, and the late Rabbi Robert P. Jacobs, in his capacity as Executive Vice-president of the St. Louis Rabbinical Association. The two of them set out to create an atmosphere of dialogue which was faithful to the aspirations of the Vatican II process of reconciliation between Jews and Catholics.

We are still going strong. Every other month, a group of about twelve dialogue participants sit down to a kosher lunch provided by an anonymous donor, and over corned beef and turkey, hold a free-wheeling discussion. Sometimes the topics touch on clergy politics, i.e., “How do rabbis/priests get assigned to congregations? At other sessions, the news of the day may form the subject matter. For the most part the dialogue centers around an agreed upon topic with readings sent out in advance. Several sessions were devoted to a careful reading of Pope Benedict’s book, Jesus of Nazareth. Most recently the group studied fundamental documents of belief of the various expressions of Judaism, from Maimonides Thirteen Principles of Judaism to the latest platform of Reform Judaism. No question or comment is ever treated as off the subject. In fact, if there were a transcript of the proceedings it would read very much like a discussion in the Talmud.

Dialogue participants do not sugar-coat their questions or their responses. With the presence of Reform, Conservative and Orthodox rabbis, there is sometimes more intra-Jewish heat generated than heat between Jews and Catholics. Along the way there is significant learning and teaching which takes place. Our priests come to appreciate the wide range of Jewish responses to religious and moral questions of the day and our rabbis develop a more nuanced understanding of how the Church works in developing its teachings and public positions.

Just for the record, no one in these dialogues has converted anyone. Both sides remain true to their faith. What really takes place is a sorting out of real and imaginary differences. Not all or even most of the real differences can be bridged. The sages of Judaism believed that theological conflicts among rabbis were like sparks striking steel and resulted in illumination. I would include this image as a worthy description of true dialogues between persons of all faiths. For each participant there is a strengthening of faith.

Pilpul, simply put, is a rabbinic dialectical process of “debate” or discussion by which a predetermined outcome is arrived at. It’s the Pharisaic tradition which Jesus Christ condemned calling it a “tradition of men” which “makes void the word of God.” Both the Jerusalem and Babylonian Talmuds are filled with pilpul which in most cases is for the purpose of circumventing Biblical law. The article below tells of rabbis and kosher-Catholic priests engaged in pilul for the purpose of circumventing the Gospel which condemns the very act they are engaged in. See Mark 7;13 for Christ’s condemnation and Mishnah tractate Nedarim for the pilpul through which the “corban” that Christ condemned in Mark 7;13 was synthesized. And note that Jesus did not only condemn the Pharisaic “corban” invention and ritual hand washing, but He said, “many other such like things you [Pharisees] do.”

Believe me when I tell you, in this “Judeo-Christian dialogue”–what is in reality pilpul–the rabbis aren’t interested in hearing the Gospel. They’re interested in finding ways around the Gospel, like their Pharisaic ideological forefathers found ways around Old Testament law. They intend to make the Gospel of none effect.

… if there were a transcript of the proceedings it would read very much like a discussion in the Talmud.

Rabbis and Catholic priests in dialogue

By Mark L. Shook – St. Louis Post Dispatch

June 19, 2008

The Vatican has taken great pains to define and structure religious dialogues between faith communities. As recently as June 7, Pope Benedict II spoke to the Pontifical Council for Inter-religious Dialogue of “the importance of truth being the goal of all dialogue and charity being the motivation behind all dialogue.” The content of the council’s meeting and the Pope’s statement seem to imply that religious dialogue is in need of guidelines to keep Catholic participants true to Church doctrine. But very few inter-faith dialogues deal with matters of deep theological import. Most are simply efforts to establish rapport and understanding.

Religious dialogues succeed or fail because of trust and respect. Achieving trust and respect takes time and dedication. Here is yet another example of a process which does not respond well to our need for instant gratification. Rabbis and priests in St. Louis have been in dialogue with each other for more than ten years. That dialogue would never have gotten off the ground had it not been for the personal bonds of friendship which existed between Father Vincent Heier, former Ecumenical officer of the St. Louis Archdiocese, and the late Rabbi Robert P. Jacobs, in his capacity as Executive Vice-president of the St. Louis Rabbinical Association. The two of them set out to create an atmosphere of dialogue which was faithful to the aspirations of the Vatican II process of reconciliation between Jews and Catholics.

We are still going strong. Every other month, a group of about twelve dialogue participants sit down to a kosher lunch provided by an anonymous donor, and over corned beef and turkey, hold a free-wheeling discussion. Sometimes the topics touch on clergy politics, i.e., “How do rabbis/priests get assigned to congregations? At other sessions, the news of the day may form the subject matter. For the most part the dialogue centers around an agreed upon topic with readings sent out in advance. Several sessions were devoted to a careful reading of Pope Benedict’s book, Jesus of Nazareth. Most recently the group studied fundamental documents of belief of the various expressions of Judaism, from Maimonides Thirteen Principles of Judaism to the latest platform of Reform Judaism. No question or comment is ever treated as off the subject. In fact, if there were a transcript of the proceedings it would read very much like a discussion in the Talmud.

Dialogue participants do not sugar-coat their questions or their responses. With the presence of Reform, Conservative and Orthodox rabbis, there is sometimes more intra-Jewish heat generated than heat between Jews and Catholics. Along the way there is significant learning and teaching which takes place. Our priests come to appreciate the wide range of Jewish responses to religious and moral questions of the day and our rabbis develop a more nuanced understanding of how the Church works in developing its teachings and public positions.

Just for the record, no one in these dialogues has converted anyone. Both sides remain true to their faith. What really takes place is a sorting out of real and imaginary differences. Not all or even most of the real differences can be bridged. The sages of Judaism believed that theological conflicts among rabbis were like sparks striking steel and resulted in illumination. I would include this image as a worthy description of true dialogues between persons of all faiths. For each participant there is a strengthening of faith.

The dialectical method (“dialogical reasoning”) in practice between Vatican prelates and the rabbis in recent decades, a type of pilpul or Kabbalistic sorcery which has effected radical change in every aspect of Catholicism, was expounded upon by Kasper and Ratzinger mentor, Hasidic philosopher, Martin Buber in his book, I and Thou. I highly recommend this book to those seeking to understand the illogic in “Jewish”-Catholic dialogue. I would say this book is far more influential in the thinking of Benedict, Kasper, et al, than most books commonly ascribed.

A lecture recently given by Massimo Giuliani, a professor of Jewish Studies and Philosophical Hermeneutics at the University of Trent, at the Pontifical Gregorian University of Rome titled, “The Shoah as a Shadow upon Jewish-Christian Dialogue and as a Stimulus to It” illustrates how this Kabbalistic sorcery works.

It is stated that:

“the Shoah” is “the climax of a centuries-long history of discrimination and persecution against the Jewish people in the West.”

I would argue that the Nazi persecution of Judaic persons during W.W.II was a reaction (antithesis) to Judaic Bolshevism and Communism (thesis); an unsurprising event in an increasingly antagonized and deChristianized Europe (synthesis). How does one expect “the West” to be Christian when Christianity is stripped from it? The Nazi persecutions of Judaic persons was the climax of a dialectic between utterly anti-Christian ideologies, Communism and Nazism, set in motion by the Judaic Zionist, Moses Hess.

Nevertheless, it is stated that this ridiculous alleged truth is painful to acknowledge, but “all ethically formed consciouses” accept this alleged truth and the pain inherent to it and that acceptance of both:

“are already an integral part of the dialogic commitment. In other words they are already constitutive and constructive elements of that readiness to listen and to interact with the other, without which no dialogue, no encounter is possible. Indeed, in the reciprocal attention of Christians and Jews the memory of the pain that was inflicted and was endured during the Shoah, and the anxiety induced by the gradual realization of the first and the more remote causes that made that tragedy possible, truly represent necessary conditions to ensure that our attention is authentic and the dialogue is sincere.”

In other words, the game is rigged. The thesis is discarded and the antithesis becomes the starting point for the dialogue. The dialogue–the dialogical process– must begin with the “pain of acknowledgement” of alleged Christian guilt for the “Shoah” as it’s genesis, rather than, for instance, the Judaic-Bolshevik terror in Russia that preceded “the Shoah,” which many would say is a culmination of millennia worth of Judaic discrimination against Christians, but hardly it’s climax. No:

“… in this dialogue Christians “begin” from this memory [of ‘The Shoah’], well expressed by the document of March 16th, 1998 called We Remember: A Reflection on the Shoah, signed by the Commission for Religious Relations with the Jews.”

In such a relativist game, it is rather comical to see such a rigid, absolute first principle. But there it is: “The Shoah,” the point of reference by which all (and I do mean ALL) things are evaluated.

The lecturer, dead seriously, demonstrates what absurd lengths this is taken to by quoting Benedict XVI, then Cardinal Ratzinger:

The drama of the Shoah has placed the whole question [of Christian Old Testament hermeneutics] in another light. [The Pontifical Biblical Commission] faced two main problems: After all that has happened, can the Christians continue in their untroubled claim that they are the legitimate heirs of the Bible of Israel? Can they continue with a Christian interpretation of this Bible, or should they rather, respectfully and humbly, abandon a claim, which, in the light of all that has taken place, necessarily smacks of presumption? And here we also find a second problem: Is it perhaps the case that the presentation of the Jews and of the Jewish people in the very text of the New Testament contributed to the creation of a hostility against this people, which favored the ideology of those who wanted to suppress it?”

To which the lecturer adds the notion that Christians are “forever spiritually linked” to the people of the Talmud and in light of “The Shoah” must rework every aspect of Christian religion:

“These are questions, therefore, that induce Christians – provided they have understood the deep significance of the greatest tragedy in Jewish history, and in virtue of the link that spiritually and forever ties the people of the Bible and the Talmud to those baptized in the name of Jesus Christ – to rethink their very identity and their own interpretation of revealed Scripture, and thus to rediscover “the holy root that supports us,” that Israel “after the flesh” (in other words, in history), which the Apostle Paul discusses with the highest theological and existential pathos. The Shoah, from being an obstacle to Jewish-Christian dialogue, has become not only a stimulus to rediscover and to reappraise Israel, its texts and its traditions, enabling Christians to dialogue with the Jews, but also a sting and a key for an analysis and a “work on oneself” that somehow encompasses all components of Christian identity: from the hermeneutics of Scripture to Christology, from ecclesiological reflection even to liturgy …” (The Shoah as a Shadow upon Jewish-Christian Dialogue and as a Stimulus to It, Massimo Giuliani, Pontifical Gregorian University, Rome – November 16th, 2004)

Prof. Massimo Giuliani teaches Jewish Studies and Philosophical Hermeneutics at the University of Trent, Italy.

He has authored several books and articles on contemporary Jewish thought and the Holocaust.

The rest of this remarkable Hasidic philosophical prose and alchemical conjunction of opposites can be read at the following link:

The dialectical method (“dialogical reasoning”) in practice between Vatican prelates and the rabbis in recent decades, a type of pilpul or Kabbalistic sorcery which has effected radical change in every aspect of Catholicism, was expounded upon by Kasper and Ratzinger mentor, Hasidic philosopher, Martin Buber in his book, I and Thou. I highly recommend this book to those seeking to understand the illogic in “Jewish”-Catholic dialogue. I would say this book is far more influential in the thinking of Benedict, Kasper, et al, than most books commonly ascribed.

A lecture recently given by Massimo Giuliani, a professor of Jewish Studies and Philosophical Hermeneutics at the University of Trent, at the Pontifical Gregorian University of Rome titled, “The Shoah as a Shadow upon Jewish-Christian Dialogue and as a Stimulus to It” illustrates how this Kabbalistic sorcery works.

It is stated that:

“the Shoah” is “the climax of a centuries-long history of discrimination and persecution against the Jewish people in the West.”

Nevertheless, it is stated that this ridiculous alleged truth is painful to acknowledge, but “all ethically formed consciouses” accept this alleged truth and the pain inherent to it and that acceptance of both:

“are already an integral part of the dialogic commitment. In other words they are already constitutive and constructive elements of that readiness to listen and to interact with the other, without which no dialogue, no encounter is possible. Indeed, in the reciprocal attention of Christians and Jews the memory of the pain that was inflicted and was endured during the Shoah, and the anxiety induced by the gradual realization of the first and the more remote causes that made that tragedy possible, truly represent necessary conditions to ensure that our attention is authentic and the dialogue is sincere.”

In other words, the game is rigged. The thesis is discarded and the antithesis becomes the starting point for the dialogue. The dialogue–the dialogical process– must begin with the “pain of acknowledgement” of alleged Christian guilt for the “Shoah” as it’s genesis, rather than, for instance, the Judaic-Bolshevik terror in Russia that preceded “the Shoah,” which many would say is a culmination of millennia worth of Judaic discrimination against Christians, but hardly it’s climax. No:

“… in this dialogue Christians “begin” from this memory [of ‘The Shoah’], well expressed by the document of March 16th, 1998 called We Remember: A Reflection on the Shoah, signed by the Commission for Religious Relations with the Jews.”

In such a relativist game, it is rather comical to see such a rigid, absolute first principle. But there it is: “The Shoah,” the point of reference by which all (and I do mean ALL) things are evaluated.

The lecturer, dead seriously, demonstrates what absurd lengths this is taken to by quoting Benedict XVI, then Cardinal Ratzinger:

The drama of the Shoah has placed the whole question [of Christian Old Testament hermeneutics] in another light. [The Pontifical Biblical Commission] faced two main problems: After all that has happened, can the Christians continue in their untroubled claim that they are the legitimate heirs of the Bible of Israel? Can they continue with a Christian interpretation of this Bible, or should they rather, respectfully and humbly, abandon a claim, which, in the light of all that has taken place, necessarily smacks of presumption? And here we also find a second problem: Is it perhaps the case that the presentation of the Jews and of the Jewish people in the very text of the New Testament contributed to the creation of a hostility against this people, which favored the ideology of those who wanted to suppress it?”

To which the lecturer adds the notion that Christians are “forever spiritually linked” to the people of the Talmud and in light of “The Shoah” must rework every aspect of Christian religion:

“These are questions, therefore, that induce Christians – provided they have understood the deep significance of the greatest tragedy in Jewish history, and in virtue of the link that spiritually and forever ties the people of the Bible and the Talmud to those baptized in the name of Jesus Christ – to rethink their very identity and their own interpretation of revealed Scripture, and thus to rediscover “the holy root that supports us,” that Israel “after the flesh” (in other words, in history), which the Apostle Paul discusses with the highest theological and existential pathos. The Shoah, from being an obstacle to Jewish-Christian dialogue, has become not only a stimulus to rediscover and to reappraise Israel, its texts and its traditions, enabling Christians to dialogue with the Jews, but also a sting and a key for an analysis and a “work on oneself” that somehow encompasses all components of Christian identity: from the hermeneutics of Scripture to Christology, from ecclesiological reflection even to liturgy …” (The Shoah as a Shadow upon Jewish-Christian Dialogue and as a Stimulus to It, Massimo Giuliani, Pontifical Gregorian University, Rome – November 16th, 2004)

Prof. Massimo Giuliani teaches Jewish Studies and Philosophical Hermeneutics at the University of Trent, Italy.

He has authored several books and articles on contemporary Jewish thought and the Holocaust.

The rest of this remarkable Hasidic philosophical prose and alchemical conjunction of opposites can be read at the following link:

The dialectical method (“dialogical reasoning”) in practice between Vatican prelates and the rabbis in recent decades, a type of pilpul or Kabbalistic sorcery which has effected radical change in every aspect of Catholicism, was expounded upon by Kasper and Ratzinger mentor, Hasidic philosopher, Martin Buber in his book, I and Thou. I highly recommend this book to those seeking to understand the illogic in “Jewish”-Catholic dialogue. I would say this book is far more influential in the thinking of Benedict, Kasper, et al, than most books commonly ascribed.

A lecture recently given by Massimo Giuliani, a professor of Jewish Studies and Philosophical Hermeneutics at the University of Trent, at the Pontifical Gregorian University of Rome titled, “The Shoah as a Shadow upon Jewish-Christian Dialogue and as a Stimulus to It” illustrates how this Kabbalistic sorcery works.

It is stated that:

“the Shoah” is “the climax of a centuries-long history of discrimination and persecution against the Jewish people in the West.”

Nevertheless, it is stated that this ridiculous alleged truth is painful to acknowledge, but “all ethically formed consciouses” accept this alleged truth and the pain inherent to it and that acceptance of both:

“… are already an integral part of the dialogic commitment. In other words they are already constitutive and constructive elements of that readiness to listen and to interact with the other, without which no dialogue, no encounter is possible. Indeed, in the reciprocal attention of Christians and Jews the memory of the pain that was inflicted and was endured during the Shoah, and the anxiety induced by the gradual realization of the first and the more remote causes that made that tragedy possible, truly represent necessary conditions to ensure that our attention is authentic and the dialogue is sincere.”

In other words, the game is rigged. The thesis is discarded and the antithesis becomes the starting point for the dialogue. The dialogue–the dialogical process– must begin with the “pain of acknowledgement” of alleged Christian guilt for the “Shoah” as it’s genesis, rather than, for instance, the Judaic-Bolshevik terror in Russia that preceded “the Shoah,” which many would say is a culmination of millennia worth of Judaic discrimination against Christians, but hardly it’s climax. No:

“… in this dialogue Christians “begin” from this memory [of ‘The Shoah’], well expressed by the document of March 16th, 1998 called We Remember: A Reflection on the Shoah, signed by the Commission for Religious Relations with the Jews.”

In such a relativist game, it is rather comical to see such a rigid, absolute first principle. But there it is: “The Shoah,” the point of reference by which all (and I do mean ALL) things are evaluated.

The lecturer, dead seriously, demonstrates what absurd lengths this is taken to by quoting Benedict XVI, then Cardinal Ratzinger:

The drama of the Shoah has placed the whole question [of Christian Old Testament hermeneutics] in another light. [The Pontifical Biblical Commission] faced two main problems: After all that has happened, can the Christians continue in their untroubled claim that they are the legitimate heirs of the Bible of Israel? Can they continue with a Christian interpretation of this Bible, or should they rather, respectfully and humbly, abandon a claim, which, in the light of all that has taken place, necessarily smacks of presumption? And here we also find a second problem: Is it perhaps the case that the presentation of the Jews and of the Jewish people in the very text of the New Testament contributed to the creation of a hostility against this people, which favored the ideology of those who wanted to suppress it?”

To which the lecturer adds the notion that Christians are “forever spiritually linked” to the people of the Talmud and in light of “The Shoah” must rework every aspect of Christian religion:

“These are questions, therefore, that induce Christians – provided they have understood the deep significance of the greatest tragedy in Jewish history, and in virtue of the link that spiritually and forever ties the people of the Bible and the Talmud to those baptized in the name of Jesus Christ – to rethink their very identity and their own interpretation of revealed Scripture, and thus to rediscover “the holy root that supports us,” that Israel “after the flesh” (in other words, in history), which the Apostle Paul discusses with the highest theological and existential pathos. The Shoah, from being an obstacle to Jewish-Christian dialogue, has become not only a stimulus to rediscover and to reappraise Israel, its texts and its traditions, enabling Christians to dialogue with the Jews, but also a sting and a key for an analysis and a “work on oneself” that somehow encompasses all components of Christian identity: from the hermeneutics of Scripture to Christology, from ecclesiological reflection even to liturgy …” (The Shoah as a Shadow upon Jewish-Christian Dialogue and as a Stimulus to It, Massimo Giuliani, Pontifical Gregorian University, Rome – November 16th, 2004)

Prof. Massimo Giuliani teaches Jewish Studies and Philosophical Hermeneutics at the University of Trent, Italy.

He has authored several books and articles on contemporary Jewish thought and the Holocaust.

The rest of this remarkable Hasidic philosophical prose and alchemical conjunction of opposites can be read at the following link:

The dialectical method (“dialogical reasoning”) in practice between Vatican prelates and the rabbis in recent decades, a type of pilpul which has effected radical change in every aspect of Catholicism, was expounded upon by Kasper and Ratzinger mentor, Hasidic philosopher, Martin Buber in his book, I and Thou. I highly recommend this book to those seeking to understand the illogic in “Jewish”-Catholic dialogue. I would say this book is far more influential in the thinking of Benedict, Kasper, et al, than most books commonly ascribed.

A lecture recently given by Massimo Giuliani, a professor of Jewish Studies and Philosophical Hermeneutics at the University of Trent, at the Pontifical Gregorian University of Rome titled, “The Shoah as a Shadow upon Jewish-Christian Dialogue and as a Stimulus to It” illustrates how this Kabbalistic sorcery works.

It is stated that:

“the Shoah” is “the climax of a centuries-long history of discrimination and persecution against the Jewish people in the West.”

Nevertheless, it is stated that this ridiculous alleged truth is painful to acknowledge, but “all ethically formed consciouses” accept this alleged truth and the pain inherent to it and that acceptance of both:

“… are already an integral part of the dialogic commitment. In other words they are already constitutive and constructive elements of that readiness to listen and to interact with the other, without which no dialogue, no encounter is possible. Indeed, in the reciprocal attention of Christians and Jews the memory of the pain that was inflicted and was endured during the Shoah, and the anxiety induced by the gradual realization of the first and the more remote causes that made that tragedy possible, truly represent necessary conditions to ensure that our attention is authentic and the dialogue is sincere.”

In other words, the game is rigged. The thesis is discarded and the antithesis becomes the starting point for the dialogue. The dialogue–the dialogical process– must begin with the “pain of acknowledgement” of alleged Christian guilt for the “Shoah” as it’s genesis, rather than, for instance, the Judaic-Bolshevik terror in Russia that preceded “the Shoah,” which many would say is a culmination of millennia worth of Judaic discrimination against Christians, but hardly it’s climax. No:

“… in this dialogue Christians “begin” from this memory [of ‘The Shoah’], well expressed by the document of March 16th, 1998 called We Remember: A Reflection on the Shoah, signed by the Commission for Religious Relations with the Jews.”

In such a relativist game, it is rather comical to see such a rigid, absolute first principle. But there it is: “The Shoah,” the point of reference by which all (and I do mean ALL) things are evaluated.

The lecturer, dead seriously, demonstrates what absurd lengths this is taken to by quoting Benedict XVI, then Cardinal Ratzinger:

The drama of the Shoah has placed the whole question [of Christian Old Testament hermeneutics] in another light. [The Pontifical Biblical Commission] faced two main problems: After all that has happened, can the Christians continue in their untroubled claim that they are the legitimate heirs of the Bible of Israel? Can they continue with a Christian interpretation of this Bible, or should they rather, respectfully and humbly, abandon a claim, which, in the light of all that has taken place, necessarily smacks of presumption? And here we also find a second problem: Is it perhaps the case that the presentation of the Jews and of the Jewish people in the very text of the New Testament contributed to the creation of a hostility against this people, which favored the ideology of those who wanted to suppress it?”

To which the lecturer adds the notion that Christians are “forever spiritually linked” to the people of the Talmud and in light of “The Shoah” must rework every aspect of Christian religion:

“These are questions, therefore, that induce Christians – provided they have understood the deep significance of the greatest tragedy in Jewish history, and in virtue of the link that spiritually and forever ties the people of the Bible and the Talmud to those baptized in the name of Jesus Christ – to rethink their very identity and their own interpretation of revealed Scripture, and thus to rediscover “the holy root that supports us,” that Israel “after the flesh” (in other words, in history), which the Apostle Paul discusses with the highest theological and existential pathos. The Shoah, from being an obstacle to Jewish-Christian dialogue, has become not only a stimulus to rediscover and to reappraise Israel, its texts and its traditions, enabling Christians to dialogue with the Jews, but also a sting and a key for an analysis and a “work on oneself” that somehow encompasses all components of Christian identity: from the hermeneutics of Scripture to Christology, from ecclesiological reflection even to liturgy …” (The Shoah as a Shadow upon Jewish-Christian Dialogue and as a Stimulus to It, Massimo Giuliani, Pontifical Gregorian University, Rome – November 16th, 2004)

Prof. Massimo Giuliani teaches Jewish Studies and Philosophical Hermeneutics at the University of Trent, Italy.

He has authored several books and articles on contemporary Jewish thought and the Holocaust.

The rest of this remarkable Hasidic philosophical prose and alchemical conjunction of opposites can be read at the following link: